The memory of her rape resurrected itself with frightening intensity: the terror she had felt, how helpless she had been. But her attacker hadn’t known or cared that she was an American, only that she was the right size and sex for his violence. Then when he had discovered she had been found alive, he had sent others to kill her. Colin had placed her in witness protection, but she had endured months of fear until her attacker had been convicted. Would her country face further attacks? The tightness in her chest made it hard to get a breath. Like her country, she had lost her innocence through violent acts on a beautifully clear fall day. And as she had, tomorrow all Americans would wake to a new and frightening world in which the rules of engagement were forever changed.
Over the pounding of her heart, she heard her mobile ring again. This time her hands were shaking when she answered.
“Are you all right, love?” a voice she knew well asked. One of the Met’s specialist firearms officers, Sergeant Simon Casey had been in charge of her witness protection team. Everything about him had frightened her at first: his stern expression, his uncompromising manner, even his icy blue eyes, which had dared her not to meet his expectations. Prior to joining the police, he had been a Special Forces operative until an injury required him to retire from military service.
“Simon, what does it mean?”
“Your country’s at war. Unless I miss my guess, we’ll be in it with you. And I’m in the wrong bloody uniform.”
“At war with who? Didn’t the terrorist die on the planes?”
“Jenny, someone sent them. It was a complex and coordinated attack. They were well trained and well equipped.”
“Simon, I can’t stop shaking.”
“Breathe. Focus. Like I taught you.”
“Is it over? Will there be more?”
“It’s too soon to know, but your people will find out who is behind it. Don’t panic. You’re safe with us.”
“Thank you, Simon.” She closed her phone. Safe. She had been safe ever since Colin had become a part of her life. He had made sure of it. She returned to the news coverage. She saw again the fireballs when the planes hit their targets. She knew how fragile people’s bodies were, how easily skin split open and bones broke. Had their blood burned, those passengers who had flown into eternity? Passengers — my God, there would have been women and children on those planes! What kind of monster planned to murder children?
Lines from Longfellow’s poem, “The Building of the Ship,” flashed through her mind: “Sail on, O Ship of State! / Humanity with all its fears, / With all the hopes of future years, / Is hanging breathless on thy fate!” The British named their warships after courageous qualities: HMS Dauntless, HMS Resolute, and HMS Invincible. Gilbert and Sullivan had poked fun at the practice by placing sailors in one of their operettas on HMS Pinafore, named for a girl’s article of clothing, but seamen on the real ships were proud of their legacy and wanted to prove themselves worthy. Now America was like the Titanic, a ship touted as unsinkable but vulnerable nonetheless to an insidious threat.
She shivered. Their flat in Hampstead, a suburb north of London, was difficult to heat, but she suspected she was chilled more by the fear in the air. She made some tea — the British palliative — and dialed her parents’ number again, but only the busy signal answered, and she felt lonely and defenseless. In witness protection the officers assigned to her had provided a constant, reassuring presence. PC Danny Sullivan, not much older than her brothers, was an inveterate practical joker who had kept the atmosphere light. Even today he would have found a way to pierce the dread and make her smile. PC Brian Davies, a huge bear of a man whose wife was now one of her closest friends, had been an outstanding cook. Maybe if the flat were filled with the aroma of one of his dishes, she would feel less alone. Even Hunt, the irreverent PC Alan Hunt, would remind her not to take life too seriously. And, of course, the ginger-haired thirty-something Simon, who had treated her tension with regular doses of exercise and challenged her to face every adversity. She respected his dedication and focus.
“Colin, I want to go home,” she said when he called again.
“You’ll have to wait for a bit. All planes are grounded in the States, and no international flights are allowed into American air space.”
“But I can’t reach my family!”
“They’ll be all right, Jenny. They are out of the line of fire. Open a bottle of wine. I’ll be home before too long. I have something for you. Wait there for me.”
It would take at least thirty minutes, she knew, for him to walk to the Embankment Station, take the Edgware branch of the Northern Line to Hampstead Station, and traverse the Hampstead streets that lay between the tube and their home. She washed her face, ran a brush through her hair, and found the corkscrew, all the while wondering what he could be bringing her.
It was an American flag.
The Witness Page 58